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CHAPTER 1

Shape Your Life with the Words of Life

The Christian life, from start to finish, is utterly dependent on the grace of God. Not only do we come into spiritual life by sheer grace (Act 18:27; Rom. 3:24; Eph. 2:5), but it is in divine grace that we continue on (Acts 13:43). It is by God's grace that our souls survive through many trials (2 Cor. 12:9; Heb. 4:16), are strengthened for everyday life (2 Tim. 2:1; Heb. 13:9), and grow into greater maturity and health (2 Pet. 3:18).

And it is God's grace that enables us to make choices and expend effort to seek more of God (1 Cor. 15:10). It is a gift that we would have the desire for and take action to avail ourselves of the means of God's grace — his voice (the word), his ear (prayer), and his people (fellowship) — with the most basic principle of grace being the immersing of our lives in his word.

The Word Original

Before we identify the presence of God's voice in our lives with the many good habits of taking in his word — whether Bible reading and study, hearing sermons, Scripture meditation and memorization, and more — first let's see his word as a general principle, rather than the specific practices.

Before printing it and binding it and covering it with leather, consider the concept of God's word. God speaks. He reveals himself to us. He communicates with us. His word, as John Frame says, is "his powerful, authoritative self-expression." Just as the words of a friend are central in revealing his person to us, so it is with God.

The one who created us — and sustains us moment by moment (Col. 1:17; Heb. 1:3) — has expressed himself to us in human words, and it is vital that we listen. The other principal means of his grace (prayer and fellowship), while equally essential, are not as fundamental as this one. Creation (Gen. 1:3) and new creation (2 Cor. 4:6) both begin with the voice of God. He initiates, and does so by speaking. This self-expression of God is so deep and rich and full that it is not just personal, but a person.

The Word Incarnate

The complete and climactic self-revelation of God to man is the God-man, his Son (Heb. 1:1–2). Jesus is "the Word" (John 1:1), and "the Word became flesh" (John 1:14). He is the one who most fully and finally "has made [the Father] known" (John 1:18). Jesus is God's culminating self-expression, and says without any sham or embellishment, "Whoever has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9).

Jesus is the Word of God embodied. He is the grace of God incarnate (Titus 2:11). So full and complete is his revealing of God that he is not a word-thing, but a Word-person. He fulfilled the destiny of humanity in his perfect life and sacrificial death (Heb. 2:9), and rose again in triumph over sin and death, and now sits at the Father's right hand, with all things being put in subjection to him (1 Cor. 15:25–28). He is the divine-human Word our souls need for survival and strength and growth. But how do we access this Word now that he sits in heaven?

The Word Evangelical

The most frequent use of word in the New Testament is in reference to the message of the gospel — the word evangelical we might call it, or the gospel word — the message about Jesus, "the word of Christ" (Col. 3:16). For Paul, the phrases "preach Christ" and "proclaim Christ" and "speak the word" are synonymous (Phil. 1:14–17). The mission of his life, Paul says, is "to testify to the gospel of the grace of God" (Act 20:24), which is "the word of his grace" (Acts 20:32).

It is "the word of truth, the gospel" that not only comes to us for conversion but also bears fruit and grows (Col. 1:5). It is "the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation" that changes everything for Christians (Eph. 1:13), and "the word of life" to which we hold fast in the midst of a crooked and perverse society (Phil. 2:15–16). And so, in the Christian fight for joy, John Piper writes, "The central strategy is to preach the gospel to yourself. ... Hearing the word of the cross, and preaching it to ourselves, is the central strategy for sinners in the fight for joy."

And as this gospel-word passes from mouth to mouth, from person to person, from people to people, from nation to nation, how will the message about Jesus stay on message? What will keep the spoken word faithful and true and life-changing? And how do we keep ourselves from falling into ruts and from defaulting to the same old canned ways of telling the message?

The Word Written

Having spied the pinnacle of God's Word in the person and work of Jesus, and the prevalence of God's word in his gospel, now we come to the essential place, this side of heaven, for God's word written. Just as crucial as it is for spiritual life that we have God in his Word Jesus, and that we have Jesus in his word the gospel, so we need the Scriptures as God's inspired, inerrant, and infallible revelation of himself.

Without the Bible, we will soon lose the genuine gospel and the real Jesus and the true God. For now, if we are to saturate our lives with the words of life, we must be people of the Book. Which is no necessary prescription to every Christian for the same particular habits. But it is a summons to the principle of soaking our lives in the voice of God and diversifying the portfolio of access points. Before pondering the many and wonderful habits of grace that might be best for you in your context and season of life, put this rock in place: Fashion rhythms of life that help you revolve around having God's incarnate Word, by God's gospel word, through God's written word.

The Word Pervasive

With such a perspective on God's word in place, countless creative routines may follow, whether it's reading through the Bible in a year, or memorizing passages or whole books, or meditating on single verses or paragraphs, or aggressively identifying and pursuing applications, or listening to sermon podcasts, or reading biblically rich content online, or taking Bible classes, or consuming Christian books, and on and on — and changing it up from time to time. The potential practices are limitless, but the principle beneath the practices is this: The fundamental means of God's ongoing grace, through his Spirit, in the life of the Christian and the life of the church is God's self-expression in his Word, in the gospel, perfectly kept for us and on display in all its textures, riches, and hues in the external written word of the Scriptures.

As we consider Bible reading, study, meditation, memorization, application, and lifelong learning in the coming chapters — and most importantly, sitting under faithful Bible preaching, which comes in part 3 — may God give you intentionality to shape your weeks with his word, ingenuity to shower your days with his voice, and creativity to punctuate your life and the lives of those around you with fresh routines for regularly availing yourself of his life-giving words.

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More on Preaching to Yourself

Before moving on to consider Bible intake in some of its many forms, let's circle back and say more about preaching the gospel to ourselves and its function as a means of grace. After all, we saw above from Piper: "Hearing the word of the cross, and preaching it to ourselves, is the central strategy for sinners in the fight for joy."

In our sin, we constantly find our responses to life in our fallen world to be disconnected from the theology that we confess. Anger, fear, panic, discouragement, and impatience stalk our hearts and whisper in our ears a false gospel that will lure our lives away from what we say we believe. The battleground is between our ears. What is it that is capturing your idle thoughts? What fear or frustration is filling your spare moments? Will you just listen to yourself, or will you start talking? No, preaching — not letting your concerns shape you, but forming your concerns by the power of the gospel.

Preaching the gospel to ourselves is a habit of grace that is both proactive and reactive. It's reactive as we encounter temptation and frustration and seek to restock in the moment, or as we reflect back on our sin and circumstances and try to evaluate them with a gospel lens. But it's also proactive. We go on the offensive when we feed our souls in some regular rhythm before the events and tasks and disappointments of daily life begin streaming our way.

There is a difference between merely reminding ourselves of truth and preaching to ourselves the truth of the gospel. It's true that two plus two equals four. But it does very little to feed our souls. What we need is not just truth, but the truth, the message of the gospel. What preaching the gospel to ourselves requires is pausing, rehearsing some expression of the Father's and Son's love and provision of goodness and rescue and joy for us, and consciously seeking to have that truth shape and permeate our reality.

As it relates to Scripture, it is important to note that gospel self-preaching is not the same thing as Bible reading, though the connections and interdependences are profound. The Scriptures, in one sense, provide the material for preaching to ourselves the gospel of grace. They are the content to be taken up and applied to our lives in view of Jesus's person and work.

It will not adequately strengthen our soul, in the long run, just to hear the same canned gospel repeated over and over. Neither will it sustain our spiritual lives to merely take in information without seeing it in light of Jesus, and pressing it into our hearts.

Read for Breadth, Study for Depth

There is some science to good Bible reading. It's important to know the fundamentals of language and communication, of subjects and verbs and objects and conjunctions. Much can be gained from boning up on some basics of English or doing some reading about reading. It's helpful to have good Bible study aids, like overviews, introductions, and reliable commentaries (especially for the Old Testament prophets), and to have a good sense of how the Scriptures are put together as a whole.

And just like we learn to ride a bike with training wheels, it can help to have someone spell out some simple method of "inductive Bible study" with the dance steps of observation, interpretation, and application. Rudimentary, memorable approaches like this abound in Christian circles serious about the Bible. They are a gift to help us get going and come to an otherwise dauntingly large book with some idea of what to do next.

But the point of learning the little bits of science behind it all is to be ready to dance when the music begins to play. And the best of dancing isn't just taught in classrooms, but caught in practice.

Good Bible reading is no mere science; it is an art. The Bible itself is a special compilation of great artistries. And the best way to learn the art of reading the Bible for yourself is this: Read it for yourself.

Ask an Old Saint

Ask an old, weathered saint who's been reading the Scriptures for himself for decades. See if he has a nice, clean formulation for how he goes about his daily reading. Does he have three or four simple, memorable steps he walks through consciously each day? The answer likely will be no; he's learned over time there's more art to it than that.

Or more generally, just ask, How do you go about reading the Bible? You might see it on his face that it's a tough question to answer. Not because there aren't some basic, little "scientific" things, like the basics of reading and comprehension, or the various patterns and methods he's developed for feeding his own soul over the years, but because he's learned that so much of good Bible reading is an art. It's a skill learned in engaging the task, not mainly sitting under formal instruction. And those who have read their Bibles most are the ones who have learned the craft best.

Learn the Art through Practice

No biblical author gives us any nice, clean acrostic for how to go about daily Bible reading. And you won't find one in this chapter. That may feel daunting for the beginner who wants assistance, but in the long run it proves wonderfully freeing. It can be a great help to have training wheels for a season, but once you learn to ride the bike, those extra things sticking out the side are terribly constrictive and limiting.

At the end of the day, there is simply no replacement for finding a regular time and place, blocking out distractions, putting your nose in the text, and letting your mind and heart be led and captured and thrilled by God himself communicating to us in his objective written words.

If you feel uncomfortable in the Scriptures and inadequate in the art of Bible reading, the single most important thing you can do is make a regular habit of reading the Bible for yourself. There is no substitute for a few focused minutes each day in the text. You may be surprised how much the little bits add up over the long haul.

As much as we want a quick fix, some fast lesson that makes us near-experts in just a few short minutes, the best of Bible reading isn't learned overnight or even after a semester of lectures, but day after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year, imbibing the Bible, having God's words inform our minds, inspire our hearts, instruct our lives. It is then that we slowly see the lights going on everywhere as we walk through life, and keep walking through the texts.

Discover the Art of Meditation

One piece of counsel for any Bible reading plan, however ambitious, is this: Don't let the push to check boxes keep you from lingering over a text, whether to seek to understand it ("study") or to emotionally glory in what you understand ("meditation").

Think of your Bible reading as a regular surveying of the biblical landscape to find a spot to settle down for a few moments to meditate, which is the high point and richest moment of Bible intake (more on meditation in the next chapter). Go for breadth (in reading) and depth (in study), where you stop at something you don't understand, pose questions and give answers, consult resources, and perhaps capture a brief reflection in words or a diagram. There is a place in Bible reading for "raking" and gathering up the leaves at a swift pace, but when we "dig" in Bible study, we unearth the diamonds. In meditation, we marvel at the jewels.

Bible reading is like watching the film in real time. Study is like going through a clip frame by frame. Meditation, then, along with Scripture memory (chap. 5), is for lingering over particular frames and pressing the significance to our hearts and into our lives.

Grow in Finding Jesus

One final thing to say about Bible reading as art, not just science, is that Jesus taught his apostles to read the Scriptures in what we might describe as an artistic way. The science part of Bible reading is essential, but it doesn't necessitate reading so rigidly, narrowly, and modernistically that only the most explicit and specific of prophecies apply to Christ, or that the text is always "for the original readers" and never really for us.

Jesus himself read the Scriptures with much more flair — not in any way making things up, but seeing with the eyes of faith what's really there to be seen below the surface, out of sight to the natural mind. Such deep reading is a kind of acquired taste, through regular practice, not an easily transferred skill; it's developing the apostolic palate for finding Jesus throughout the Scriptures, by tracking the trajectory of God's grace, in its many textures and tones, without falling into either unbelief or make-believe. It is learning with the apostle John that "the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy" (Rev. 19:10).

And so "beginning with Moses and all the Prophets," Jesus himself "interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself" (Luke 24:27). He claimed, "Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day. He saw it and was glad" (John 8:56). He said Moses "wrote of me" (John 5:46), and that "everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled" (Luke 24:44). And so he opened their minds — beyond their narrow, fallen rationality — to truly understand the Scriptures (Luke 24:45).

As we learn to read the Bible not only with our left brains but with our whole minds and hearts, we see more and more how the apostles heard the whispers of the Scriptures — and how they saw pointers to Jesus everywhere.

Resolved: To Read the Bible

Whether you feel like a beginner or the grizzled old veteran, one of the most important things you can do is regularly read the Bible for yourself.

It is a remarkable thing that we have Bibles we can read personally, whenever we want. For most of church history, and still today in many places in the world, Christians have not had their own personal copies of the Bible. They had to gather to hear someone read it to them. "Devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture" (1 Tim. 4:13) was all they had, other than memory, for Bible intake.

But now, with printed Bibles and electronic options galore, we have priceless access to God's very words to us, words that we are so tragically tempted to take lightly. Reading your own copy of the Bible daily is not a law that every believer must abide; most Christians have not had this option. But the habit of daily Bible reading can be a marvelous means of God's grace. Why miss this bounty and blessing?

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Excerpted from "Habits of Grace"
by .
Copyright © 2016 David C. Mathis.
Excerpted by permission of Good News Publishers.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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